I used to read it with a kind of horrified fascination (it was provided at my workplace in London). I'd never seen journalism like it and reading it sometimes felt a bit like observing a train wreck in slow motion. That's the best I can describe it.

I left the UK and spent a year in the middle east. This was "before the internet" and I enjoyed the whole year with no newspapers (or TV). It was liberating actually.

.....Returned to the UK and upon opening the Daily Mail one morning I got an immediate reaction - a strong SICK feeling.

Bad, bad newspaper. And something about it is fundamentally unhealthy.

Funny - my very first thought upon seeing their poll was to mentally ask this exact question!:victory:

I did not actually send that comment in to them, though, as I thought that stooping to their level would not help matters....that said, I do find it amusing that you started a poll about it on here (I don't have a problem with discussion on here turning their question back on them - when I said that about stooping to their level I meant if I actually sent a comment in it would be doing so)

That's been in my favourites since he did that, it's just a best, sweetest satire in true Russell Howard style. Here's a slightly better version on Youtube from the BBC "You just killed a polar bear, YOU!!!" It's just so darn funny, the height of Mock The Week.

I found the page with all the polls listed and I thought I'd do this little compliation for you so you know exactly what the 'truth' is about the world

Modern day mothers are too pushy

Compulsory parenting lessons will not reduce teen pregnancy rates

Global warming is not caused by man

An affair is not the key to a healthy marriage

From this we can deduce that pushy teenage mothers will continue to get willfully pregnant in a world that is naturally getting warmer despite a huge explosion in population presumably caused by all those teenage mothers. Oh, and don't cheat, apparently it doesn't help a marriage (well, 21% think it does so don't marry them) And North Korea will win the World Cup, place your bets now folks!

I need an American translation for Russell Howard. I laughed anyway, even though I understood about 50% of what he said.

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I guess you need to know a little bit about UK newspapers for it to be funny, but, here goes...

"The Daily Express" - unremitting horror - They may as well get rid of all the news every day and just print "DON'T GO OUTSIDE! It's full of gays, blacks and crime! Oh, if only Princess Diana were here..."
"The Daily Mail" - ASBOs, Muslims, Speed cameras, speed cameras, ASBOs, Muslims, Speed cameras...
(An ASBO is an anti-social behaviour order, basically used instead of an old-fashioned clip round the ear or 'common decency', the theory being that Britain's youth are so out-of-control and parenting is so bad that the State has to take over and criminalise petty offences. It's sort of a badge of pride for youngsters...)
"The Sun" - Are you a paedophile? Are you a paedophile? Now look at this page 3 spread, she's 16 today, get a load of that rack. Are you a paedophile?
(This is unsubtly pointing out the hypocrisy of the Sun in that it funds vigilante hunts of paedophiles while encouraging its readers to ogle teenage girls.)
"The Independent" - it's like it's grabbed you by the throat - WHY AREN'T YOU RECYCLING? YOU JUST KILLED A POLAR BEAR!
"The Guardian" - in the corner fanning itself with a wallchart, "You silly little things, tell 'em, Telegraph"
(The Guardian is really quite left-wing... WAY to the left of Obama, for example, and deals in a seasoned brand of intellectual snobbery. And that's coming from me, the bleeding-heart liberal...)
"The Daily Telegraph" - criCKET! criCKET!
(this is done in the style of an old working class Monty Python character. Not quite sure why he chose that for the Telegraph).

One of my staff is from the States and she was utterly horrified by the double standards in the British press when she first came here, so much so that she did an degree project about it...

I guess you need to know a little bit about UK newspapers for it to be funny, but, here goes...

"The Daily Express" - unremitting horror - They may as well get rid of all the news every day and just print "DON'T GO OUTSIDE! It's full of gays, blacks and crime! Oh, if only Princess Diana were here..."
"The Daily Mail" - ASBOs, Muslims, Speed cameras, speed cameras, ASBOs, Muslims, Speed cameras...
(An ASBO is an anti-social behaviour order, basically used instead of an old-fashioned clip round the ear or 'common decency', the theory being that Britain's youth are so out-of-control and parenting is so bad that the State has to take over and criminalise petty offences. It's sort of a badge of pride for youngsters...)
"The Sun" - Are you a paedophile? Are you a paedophile? Now look at this page 3 spread, she's 16 today, get a load of that rack. Are you a paedophile?
(This is unsubtly pointing out the hypocrisy of the Sun in that it funds vigilante hunts of paedophiles while encouraging its readers to ogle teenage girls.)
"The Independent" - it's like it's grabbed you by the throat - WHY AREN'T YOU RECYCLING? YOU JUST KILLED A POLAR BEAR!
"The Guardian" - in the corner fanning itself with a wallchart, "You silly little things, tell 'em, Telegraph"
(The Guardian is really quite left-wing... WAY to the left of Obama, for example, and deals in a seasoned brand of intellectual snobbery. And that's coming from me, the bleeding-heart liberal...)
"The Daily Telegraph" - criCKET! criCKET!
(this is done in the style of an old working class Monty Python character. Not quite sure why he chose that for the Telegraph).

One of my staff is from the States and she was utterly horrified by the double standards in the British press when she first came here, so much so that she did an degree project about it...

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Now Russell's got me hoWWWW-ling. Oh that is so funny. Thank you thank you thank you for taking the time to both translate and interpret for me. I'm heading back over to watch it again with a new understanding of your language. Bless you!!!

The Daily Mail's poll seems to be down now which is perhaps a shame because it seemed to be saying, when I last checked, that 90% of Mail readers think yes CFS is real, which might have been at least useful news for all concerned to hear. Although in one way it was an insulting question to ask, the only way to increase the figure of those answering 'no' in such a poll is to keep raising the question with them and discussing the science with them, so if the figure was coming in very high that would surely have been good for us? Unfortunately it seems the poll was not a success and has been removed - perhaps they didn't like the look of this thread? If so, then we may have shot ourselves in the foot once again.

I don't want to be in the position of praising or defending the British media, least of all (well perhaps not quite) the Daily Mail. But I do want to make a quick point.

I have been closely following health news on anything related to CFS, MCS, etc, in all major UK newspapers, via Google News, for the last 10 years or so. During that time, I've increasingly come to respect two newspapers as having an open mind on controversial health issues where other papers tend to maintain a cautiously-expressed but firm establishment line. In my admittedly limited assessment, the two papers that represent the best avenue for getting positive publicity for us are - or were - the Daily Mail and the Independent. Sadly the Guardian appears to be nowhere on any of these issues - I'm told the relevant journalist at the Guardian is a mate of SW's but I've seen no evidence of that, but in any case its coverage of at least this broad area of health lets down the expectations of what we can usually rely on from the Guardian. Regarding the Mail, however, my impression has been that health news of relevance to us - certainly regarding MCS which is what I've focused on particularly, and on related issues - is more likely to be covered there, and more likely to be covered sympathetically and with an open mind than in other papers. It surprised me greatly to find this, but that has been my impression, and I was disappointed that this time round their report about the study followed the party line - notably, there was no dissent anywhere this time, and all papers reported the study 'whole' including those several who failed to report at all on the original WPI study - basically I got the impression that they all just re-edited the press release...I was similarly disappointed in The Independent, which as the first and most positive to report on the WPI study, would have been expected to stick to their guns at least to the extent of investigating the counter-opinion and getting some quotes and a critique in their report. The whole UK media did a rotten and lazy job on this study, as far as I can tell. Haven't checked The Scotsman though, they can be good...

Anyway my assessment would be that if we want to get some interested and sympathetic UK media coverage on CFS/XMRV, our best bets may be the Independent and the Daily Mail, and we should be establishing good relationships - and conversations - with those papers and those correspondents. Campaigners and advocates (meaning all of us) can't afford to disregard or denigrate sections of the media, they have to put their personal prejudices aside, try to speak to everyone and see what floats, and build on every opportunity to establish key relationships. It may be that our biggest supporters turn up in unexpected places.

ETA: Or, please let me know if I missed anything particularly offensive in Daily Maily coverage of CFS, in which case apologies in advance and I'll prepare to dust off the 'embarrassed' emoticons...

Oh, I forgot to say, Russell Howard did a great little impression of Tigger with ME ("not tonight, piglet") - I saw it when I was a bit sicker than I am at the moment, and was watching lots of comedy to cheer myself up. Almost fell off the sofa I found it so funny.

I wish it was on YouTube somewhere. But I am not sure whether anybody here would find it offensive. There's a fine line with humour, isn't there?